Automobile travel is by far the most dangerous form of travel in this country. About 50,000 people are killed each year, and more than a million people are injured. At the same time, roads and highways are becoming more congested--a situation which lends itself to increased travel time and more accidents.
Various systems for keeping vehicles a safe distance apart even while they are traveling at high speeds have been studied since Rosenfeld, U.S. Pat. No. 1,983,882. One of the most recent such systems is disclosed by Butssuen et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,574,644, which issued Nov. 12, 1996.
But each of the prior art combinations works best only when the vehicles involved are traveling under good road conditions. Their respective braking systems rely on tire-to-road surface contact, an approach which may fail during heavy rain or snow events.
Further, these vehicles depend on tire-to-road surface contact for stability when cornering. Even though many accidents are caused when a driver loses control of his vehicle while turning, the prior art has largely ignored this problem.